My SIXTY-SECOND Open Letter To Senator Pat Toomey (UPDATED)

I'll be dropping this letter to Senator Pat Toomey in the mail today:

Dear Senator Toomey:

It's me, again - the constituent who writes for the local Pittsburgh-based political blog, "2 Political Junkies."

I'd like to as you about our new Director of Central Intelligence, Gina Haspel. You wrote on your Facebook page that you support her nomination. I'm curious about that support, considering how she oversaw a program that tortured someone. Reportedly, she was also involved in the destruction of video tapes showing other detainees at other CIA "black sites" being tortured. There was torture and then covering up torture - all overseen in one way or another by Gina Haspel.

The UN Convention Against Torture was signed by Ronald Reagan in 1988 and ratified by the US Senate in 1994. It is US Law. It says that torture is illegal - no mitigating circumstances allowed. No one can claim to have been "simply following orders" No one can claim it was necessary in the face of an emergency. Torture is simply illegal and Gina Haspel oversaw a torture program.

So here's my question: Now that she's been installed as head of CIA, how could we as a nation possibly criticize any other country for whatever torture programs they might be running when our own Director of Central Intelligence oversaw (and covered up) just such a program?

I await your response.

And I will be posting whatever response I get from him or his office.

UPDATE: The Senator has responded to this letter. 

Follow-up:

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